Shofar FTP Archive File: people/h/hoess.rudolf.ferdinand/wolzek.01

Path: news2.digex.net!digex.net!not-for-mail
From: mstein@access5.digex.net (Michael P. Stein)
Newsgroups: alt.revisionism
Subject: auschwitz:myths and facts
Supersedes: <4t0fc6$keh@access5.digex.net>
Date: 22 Jul 1996 14:00:42 -0400
Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA
Lines: 106
Message-ID: <4t0fka$kjj@access5.digex.net>
References: <21JUL199621250929@misvms.bpa.arizona.edu> <4sv7j2$ov5@newsbf02.news.aol.com>
In article ,
Jamie McCarthy wrote:
>ehrlich606@aol.com (Ehrlich606) wrote:
>
>> dmittleman@misvms.bpa.arizona.edu (Danny Mittleman) writes:
>>
>> > We also know (or at least it is extremely reasonable to deduce) that
>> > Hoess was referring to Belzac when "Wolzek" was written down.
>
>Good guess, but I'm afraid it's not very likely. Hoess _lists_ the
>camps at least once, mentioning Belzec and Wolzek together.
>
>http://www.nizkor.org/ftp.cgi?people/h/hoess.rudolf/treblinka-wolzek
>
>> This transliteration error bit doesn't make sense to me.
>
>What does make sense is Mike Stein's theory that Wolzek is Sobibor. The
>two are never given by Hoess together, in fact the word "Sobibor" does
>not occur in any of Hoess' statements of which I am aware. Also, Hoess'
>description of the location of the supposed Wolzek camp fits nicely with
>the location of Sobibor. Perhaps Mr. Stein could be convinced to repost
>his explanation (and Cc me in email so I can upload it to Nizkor).
I too originally entertained the theory that it was a mishearing or
mispronunciation of Belzec. That is not tenable, although not for the
reasons Ehrlich suggests - what counts is how Hoess the non-native-Polish
speaker would have pronounced Belzec, not how the Poles did. However,
Hoess did say Wolzek; he repeated it several times including in the same
list as Belzec. So it was not a simple one-time mishearing on the part of
the interrogator or a one-time-only confused and/or mumbled repetition by
Hoess.
So we have three possibilities:
1) Hoess was told what to say by his captors, who made up a
mythical camp "Wolzek."
2) Hoess was tortured and just made something up to satisfy his
captors.
3) Hoess made a mistake about the name, but the camp exists.
Number 1 makes little sense. If there was some vast plot to frame the
Nazis, as so many "revisionists" claim, why weren't more Nazis tortured
into naming this same "Wolzek?"
Number 2 is a possibility. But so is number 3. Let's see if we can
locate "Wolzek" by following the clues Hoess left in his testimony.
Hoess said it was "near Lublin." At first blush that sounds like
Majdanek, which was not an extermination camp like Treblinka and Belzec.
If this were all we had to go on, I would say it sounds like Hoess is
making something up. However, the citation below gives some very
important additional clues.
From:
"THE HOLOCAUST: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes"
edited by John Mendelson,
c. 1982 Garland Publishing
"Volume 12. The 'Final Solution' in the Extermination Camps and the Aftermath"
(pp. 56-127)
"Testimony of Rudolf Hoess Taken at Nurnberg Germany on 1 April 1946.
...(page 75) ...
Q. What were these extermination camps? Where were they, and what were
their names?
A. There were three camps: first Treblinka, Belzak (sic) near Lemberg
[Lvov] and the third one was 40 kilometers in the direction of Kulm
[Chelm]. It was past Kulm in an easterly direction."
Belzec is 85 km from Lvov. So "near" is not all _that_ near.
The other clue, a location relative to Chelm (67 km east-southeast of
Lublin by road) is very promising.
The major camps were on rail lines. There is a rail line going east
out of Chelm. Taking it due east 40 km puts one in the Ukraine, at
Ljuboml. No camp.
However, the directions were a little more vague: "in an easterly
direction." A couple km east of Chelm, a track branches off to the
north-northeast. Approximately 40km from Chelm along that branch is a
village slightly to the east of the track.
Its name? Sobibor. About 100km from Lublin as the crow flies; if
Hoess considered Belzec to be "near" Lvov at 85km, Sobibor could be
called "near" Lublin.
Now, according to the revisionists, Hoess is discredited because he
named an extermination camp which did not exist. However, he gave
directions to this nonexistent camp which could lead one to a very real
extermination camp with a different name, a camp which others called an
extermination camp under its correct name. Quite an amazing coincidence
for someone who was just making something up to satisfy the people
torturing him, I would say.
--
Mike Stein The above represents the Absolute Truth.
POB 10420 Therefore it cannot possibly be the official
Arlington, VA 22210 position of my employer.

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